Words and Thoughts of Joshua Scott Witsaman

Tag Archives: Hugh Bolton Jones

So it seems like winter is going to be a little clingy this year. The cold grip of the dark months is reluctant to release us into the warm embrace of spring and summer! The trees are beginning to bloom, flowers have sprouted up from beneath the soil, and we’ve already had several days in the 70’s. Yet alas we are once more plunged into the 20’s and 30’s and slapped with frost and snow. Then with a violent whiplash it thaws for a few days and teases our senses with a few hours of warmth before decimating our hopes and dreams with more cold and schizophrenic flurries!

However when you think about it, how bad can it really be? We know a warm-up is around the corner (eventually) we just have to wait it out a few weeks until our planet’s tilting axis can really set into place and hit us with a little heat.

Now here’s a question: Which is worse, a lingering winter that delays our joyous springtime making us anxious with anticipation? OR a prolonged autumn that teases us with warmth but which leaves us dreadful for we know it can’t keep away the inevitable encroachment of winter?

Personally I love the winter so I don’t see anything wrong with either of these options.

That being said, just because one loves snow and cold doesn’t mean they’re not susceptible to the dismal affect it can have on ones mood! If the winter months were simply a solid stretch of crisp, sub-zero temperatures, with piles of snow and ice slowly accumulating over the months it would be perfect. However there are always those gross stretches of winter, usually at the start and end of the season, where the world is just snowless and barren and grey and bland. Those inglorious times when it’s not quite cold enough to freeze and the ground is frothy with mud and slush. Sidewalks, cars, and roads are washed out with thick coatings of salt and the earth and sky seem to swirl into a colorless smear of greige. Trees are bare, grass is trampled, and any other plant life is shrived and brown.

That’s when I’m not a fan of winter. That’s when I find winter depressing. When the world seems like a silent, cold husk, and all hope is lost.

While flipping through my notebook I found a poem I wrote that deals with this subject: